Return To The Hills

We're ba-cccck! Back in the hills and behaving like pioneers, almost. No utilities. Using a cooler for a fridge, going to the mountain stream for water, going to sleep nights when Mother Nature turns off the lights at 8:30, and waking up 12 hours later, something we'd never do at home!

Despite the fact that we left home with searing, humid heat,we came into the mountains that has seen fewer days of sunshine this summer than ever before. Rain, rain, and more rain. The sunny days find us constantly on our new deck, another thing we can't do at home. Being cooped up in a 12' x 12' building we call a shed, but fancily we say cabin, during the constant rain isn't our idea of a vacation. But, hey, we sleep under a down comforter nights, and we don't have to pay utility bills for two or three months. There's some equalizing to all of this.

We aren't pioneers because we don't plant a garden, build our fire for cooking, use the same clothes constantly, or sit by a fire nights mending our socks. But we feel like pioneers because our way of life here in the lower Catskills is a dramatic change from our usual life in town. We love it and hate to grow too old to return.

Why We Love Our Summers

Here's a hodge-podge of what we love about the lower Catskills:



Our 12'x 12' cabins, the right one houses the kitchen/dining with the bedroom on the left.
We're proud of the outdoor bath house where the vanity greets you.
Our prized 1932 tub,where we stand for our showers. The compost toilet isn't exciting to show.
A quick look at our kitchen stove...and our eating area...



The fern "painting" that greets us as we approach the cabins from a different direction...and Beaverbrook, right, a stone's throw down the hill. A short trip up the hill from the brook is our son's cabin, below. He lives "off the grid" weekends only.


In Mississippi we sit in our roomy home with all necessary amenities when we'd rather be in our small cabin, where we haul water several times a week, replenish the ice in the ice chest just as often, and sit on our new deck, which isn't quite ready for a snapshot. This is our little heaven, our Shangri-La.